R.I. education chief Gist asks parents to challenge schools

PROVIDENCE — State Education Commissioner Deborah A. Gist urged parents to look beyond their schools’ rankings and ask principals to spell out what they are doing to improve student performance.The state...

PROVIDENCE — State Education Commissioner Deborah A. Gist urged parents to look beyond their schools’ rankings and ask principals to spell out what they are doing to improve student performance.

The state Department of Education released the latest round of school classifications on Tuesday. This is the second year that Rhode Island has used this system, which no longer relies on the number of students scoring proficient on standardized tests.

The new system looks at whether students are making progress, whether specific groups of students are improving, whether the school is approaching its 2017 academic targets, and, in the case of high schools, whether the school is hitting its graduation goals.

The approach is designed to correct many of the flaws of the federal No Child Left Behind law. Under NCLB, all schools were supposed to reach proficiency in English and math by 2014. Now, each school sets its own academic targets.

“This isn’t about labeling or being negative,” Gist said during a news conference. “We intentionally decided not give our schools grades. Classifying a school as a priority school means that that school is a priority for RIDE.”

From highest to lowest, schools are ranked as commended, leading, typical, warning, focus or priority.

More than half of Providence’s public schools are priority or focus schools, which means they are among the lowest-performing schools in the state. But that doesn’t mean they haven’t made progress, Gist said.

Central Falls High School, for example, is classified as a priority school and yet it has made substantial changes to its curriculum, teacher training programs and school climate. But, Gist said, schools must show steady improvement over time to demonstrate that they are on the right track.

She said families should use the rankings as a starting point to ask deeper questions: Are children improving? What is the school doing to boost student achievement? Is the school closing gaps between white students and minority students?

In the urban districts, however, some schools have been failing their students for years. How should parents feel about that?

“That’s what wakes me up every day,” Gist said. “It’s what consumes us” at the Department of Education.

Statewide, 7 percent of Rhode Island’s 279 schools are classified as priority or focus, about the same percentage as last year.

Eight percent or 24 schools are classified as commended and 12 of those schools are new to this ranking. A commended school is recognized for its high performance or significant progress.

The commended schools include Blackstone Valley Prep Elementary School in Cumberland, a charter school that opened in 2009 and whose third-graders took the New England Common Assessment Program for the first time last fall.

Music and arts are a rich part of the daily curriculum, according to Head of School Jeremy Chiappetta. Every third grader is taught to play the violin and every second grader learns the recorder.

“Music is foundational,” he said. “Our third-grade math scores are among the highest in the state.”

The Segue Institute for Learning, a charter middle school in Central Falls, disputes its classification as a focus school.

“When we look at our data, our students outperform the sending districts,” said Segue principal Angelo Garcia. “Charters are held to a higher standard and that’s a good thing. We’re working with RIDE to get our questions answered.”

Four schools, including Esek Hopkins Middle School and Nathan Bishop Middle School in Providence, moved up in the rankings. Michael Lazzareschi, the departing principal of Bishop, attributed his school’s gains to math and reading programs for low-performing students, a stable student population and a close analysis of testing data.

He also pointed to the school’s “wonderful guidance staff,” which follows the same cohort of students from sixth through eighth grade. Bishop is also blessed with having a stable student enrollment.

For a complete list of classifications, go to ride.ri.gov and select “news.”